Reports: The Leicester City decision Steve Cooper should have made to follow his own ruthless request

“You don’t have any results given to you in this league. You really have to earn whatever you get. Part of that is being ruthless. Do we want and need to be ruthless in games to get what we want? Of course.”

That was Leicester City manager Steve Cooper on Thursday when he sat down to preview his team’s clash with Aston Villa. It was a spot-on assessment. But heeding his own words is more difficult in practice.

Because it’s not just the players who have to be more ruthless, it’s Cooper too. There was an opportunity there against Villa, and it felt like Cooper didn’t take it until it was too late.

Lamare Bogarde was very clearly Villa’s weak point. A 20-year-old centre-back who had never played above League One level had been thrown in at right-back for his Premier League debut. It showed. He looked nervous, in and out of possession.

Jordan Ayew, clever as he is, quickly figured him out, and was able to pinch possession from Bogarde a few times or force him to mislay a pass. But Ayew’s qualities do not lie in beating men one-on-one. He’s about industry, retaining the ball and winning free-kicks, rather than bamboozling a full-back with quick feet and acceleration.

Ayew was having a good game and did not necessarily deserve to be substituted. But if Cooper had taken the ruthless move, he’d have recognised Bogarde’s vulnerability and brought Stephy Mavididi on at half-time.

Even in midweek against Tranmere, Mavididi showed he can be frustrating. But the evidence of the past year also shows he’s the best one-on-one player attacker City have to play on the left wing.

To bring him on at half-time would have been a real show of intent. But having not taken that opportunity, another chance to introduce Mavididi presented itself in the 55th minute, when Bogarde got booked. Now he was on even shakier ground. Again, Cooper stuck with the same 11.

It was not until Jhon Duran, one of Villa’s substitutes, put them 2-0 ahead that Cooper made changes, including Mavididi. Five minutes later, the winger tore past Bogarde to set up Facundo Buonanotte’s goal.

Six minutes later, Bogarde was withdrawn, with Kosta Nedeljkovic coming up. The Serb is even younger than Bogarde, but is slightly more experienced, is a natural right-back, and wasn’t on a yellow card.

It was a change made by Unai Emery as part of Villa’s plan to shut the game down. They slowed down their own possession and fought to win soft free-kicks. They could do so knowing they still had the lead.

But if Mavididi had come on 20 minutes earlier than he did, or even 10 minutes earlier, and he had breezed past Bogarde to earn City an equaliser, rather than merely give them a lifeline, it could have been a different game. Villa would have had to keep looking for a second goal, and there would have been more space for City to work in.

Cooper has said he felt City could have come away with a better result in all three of their Premier League matches so far. Against Villa, not bringing on Mavididi or attacking players earlier felt like the moment where the points were won and lost.

It would have been a brave decision to take off Ayew at half-time and put Mavididi on, and of course it is easier to say it should have been done in hindsight. But calculated gambles may be required for City to pick up points this season. Fortune favours the bold, and all that.

The good news is that Cooper is a reflective manager. He’s not afraid to analyse his own tactics and decisions. It doesn’t feel like a lesson that will go unlearned.

City cannot finish this season in the relegation zone and be left wondering ‘what if?’ Ruthlessness must be shown, on the pitch and in the dugout.

Ndidi and Buonanotte show striking balance is difficult

That the likes of Mavididi and Buonanotte were not on the pitch from the first whistle has been the biggest bone of contention among supporters in the aftermath of the defeat. Cooper has a difficult balance to strike.

The decision to play Ndidi in an advanced midfield position and put Oliver Skipp and Harry Winks in the centre of the park with him was not an unreasonable one. Cooper said the choice was made in order for City to match Villa physically and go toe to toe with them before opening up later in the game. Ndidi can be a towering presence at times, whereas Buonanotte is a few inches shorter and a fair bit scrawnier.

It felt like a pragmatic move, one that showed Villa respect for the Champions League team they are. It felt like the initial plan was to stick in the game. Perhaps Cooper has been scarred by the starts City made against Spurs and Fulham, in which they were comfortably second best and could have conceded more early goals than they did.

Villa were still the more dangerous team in the first half, and still had the greater number of chances, with Mads Hermansen needed to pull off two expert pieces of goalkeeping to deny Ollie Watkins. But the intense pressure City were under during the early stages against Spurs and Fulham weren’t repeated.

It did, however, affect the attack. City were not a threat in the first half. It felt like the referee had more touches of the ball than Jamie Vardy in the first hour. But that was also partly on Ndidi playing beneath himself in attacking areas. He miscontrolled the ball six times, four more times than any other City player on the day, and that was six times attacks broke down. He’s not a natural attacking midfielder, but he is better than what he showed.

The pragmatic approach gives them a chance to feel a game out. As mentioned, braver, earlier substitutions are then required, but there is a lot to be said for sticking in a game. It means there’s always a chance of picking up a point.

In the longer term, it helps belief. During their great escape of 2014-15, City didn’t lose a single game by more than two goals. They were always close. It meant they never lost heart. Sitting bottom of the table, seven points adrift of safety with two months to go could have left them despondent. But that they had not been handsomely beaten all season allowed them to retain belief they could dig themselves out of their hole.

There is no doubt that City were better against Villa once the substitutes had been introduced. The attacking players controlled and used the ball better in forward areas, and there were greater opportunities for City to get near the box. But equally, Villa were defending a lead and had sat back, letting City come onto them. The state of the game played its part in City having a greater share of possession in Villa territory.

It’s clear Cooper is still figuring out how best to balance the team, so that they can start a match with defensive security but also with an attacking threat. They’re yet to do that.

If Ndidi had played as he is capable of doing, Cooper’s tactics would have been closer to striking that balance. But equally, playing Buonanotte may have got them closer still. He may not have the physical presence of Ndidi, but he works hard and he bites at ankles. He does his bit defensively. It’s food for thought over the international break.

Centre-back changes offer up conundrum

It wasn’t just in midfield that Cooper selected players to better deal with the opposition, he did so in defence too. At centre-back, Caleb Okoli was brought in for his Premier League debut.

Jannik Vestergaard has not done badly in the opening two matches, but without saying it directly, Cooper was concerned by the Dane’s lack of pace against Watkins and Villa’s frontline. Hence Okoli being drafted in.

“It’s different attributes because there are different requirements for playing against different teams,” the manager said. “It’s about who you feel can have the best impact and deal with the opponents’ threat.

“They play well, Villa. But I also know they can look really good on breakaways and counter-attacks. You need to be able to deal with that as well. It was good for Caleb, I thought he did well.”

Okoli did do well. There certainly weren’t too many times where he was outpaced and if he was, it was usually down to incorrect positioning rather than lacking speed. And if the Italian won the race, he won the physical battle too. Not many attackers will outmuscle him this season.

Again, there’s a balance to strike for Cooper. The success of a centre-back partnership is often built on the understanding the two defenders have. They need to protect and cover for each other, and often, they need to be able to do so on instinct, rather than by communicating.

If Cooper is chopping and changing his centre-backs depending on the opponent, there possibly will be more moments of misunderstanding between the pair at the back. But is that preferable to having the wrong man in, one whose weaknesses can be exposed by the opposition? That will lead to some tricky decisions this season.

How greater possession influenced display

Inside the first minute against Villa, City regained possession and five or six players simultaneously did the universal gesture for ‘calm it down’. It felt clear there had been a message around keeping cool heads on the ball and not panicking.

City followed that instruction throughout the match and finished with 57 per cent possession. That was a surprise. It’s the second-highest share of the ball Cooper has had as a Premier League manager – only having more for a Nottingham Forest game against Everton in his final month in charge at the City Ground – and it came against a side in Villa who averaged 53 per cent possession last season, the seventh highest in the Premier League.

It wasn’t just a matter of changing tactics and mentality, but the personnel too. It all made a difference. Skipp, as a ball-playing midfielder coming deep, made himself an option to receive passes, also freeing up Winks.

Plus, Skipp drifted left, and Jordan Ayew stayed wider than Bobby De Cordova-Reid had been doing, and that gave Victor Kristiansen more options when on the ball. The Dane’s pass completion rate shot up, from 59 per cent against Fulham to 82 per cent against Villa.

It made an impact in where City had the ball. They had 131 touches in the final third on Saturday, only one fewer than they’d had there in the first two games combined.

Controlling possession also kept Villa from reaching the danger zones more often. The visitors had 20 touches in City’s box, compared to 30 for Fulham and 58 for Tottenham.

Where City had trouble was in converting that possession in the final third into chances in the box. They had marginally more touches inside the area than in their opening two outings, but they only had three shots from inside the 18-yard box, having had six each in those first two matches. Again, that comes back to the delay in getting attacking players on the pitch.

But certainly, the improvements in possession, especially against such a decent team, bode well for the season. Getting on the ball closer to the opposition’s goal should, in the long run, lead to a greater share of the big chances and with it more goals.

Plenty of teams to battle at the bottom

The first international break of the season provides a brief period for reflection on the games so far. From a points perspective, City would hope to have earned more than one, but their current tally is what many expected them to have from the three opponents they were drawn to open the campaign against.

Performance-wise, there’s been enough on show, especially against Spurs and Villa, for there to be belief that the team can compete and can pick up enough points to avoid the drop. Considering where they were at half-time against Tottenham, that’s a relief.